Adaptation

by Kaitlyn O'Connor

  His hands tightened on her. "Feel goot, Kat. No feel goot to Kat? Dis why no want?"

  She was a total sucker! She knew his earnest questions had a lot more to do with what he wanted than any anxiety that she wasn't pleased with him, but she decided he'd been convincing enough.

  Besides, she was horny. As much as she hated to admit it even to herself she hadn't just gotten used to having the guys around in the time she'd spent with them. She'd enjoyed every minute of the things they'd done with her.

  What possible difference could it make now if she couldn't resist the urge to be intimate with them? She'd already succumbed to Ronan's persuasion. Granted, she'd been trying to convince herself ever since that it was just a minor lapse and that she could still recover her distance, but she knew better. She'd known better when she fell right into bed with Ronan!

  She was already pregnant. He couldn't get her more pregnant-hopefully! He wasn't going to get the idea that he was her mate because he was already convinced of that!

  She pulled away from him resolutely. He didn't make any attempt to stop her and that settled it in her mind. Whatever he was, he wasn't inclined to force his will on her. Taking his hand, she led him across the room to her bunk and then released her hold and removed her clothing.

  He watched her keenly. That made for a few awkward moments because it flickered through her mind to wonder what she looked like to him.

  Of course, he'd never seen a woman of his own clan, but did that mean he actually found her desirable? Or was she only desirable because she had a warm, wet hole he wanted to get in to?

  He distracted her from her unpleasant thoughts by reaching for her. She was almost surprised when he didn't snatch her off her feet, toss her onto the bunk and start rutting.

  She didn't think she would've been surprised or particularly alarmed if he had.

  The plain fact was, she had no idea what to expect from any of them … except surprise.

  She'd spent almost a week with Dax and the others, pretending she had no idea that they were the Sirians and treating them like Earth lovers. She'd spent the past several days since she'd finally gotten them out of jail trying to figure them out and trying to acquaint them with Earth/human customs. And they still regularly blew her mind because their minds were so different.

  He redirected her attention by coasting his cupped palms lightly along her arms and shoulders. The fine hairs all over her body reacted instantly by standing erect, creating a prickling sensation that sent a light shiver through her. Blood rushed into surface capillaries, warming her skin. It engorged her nipples, making them harden and stand erect and throbbing for a touch.

  Drawn by her reaction, he cupped her breasts, massaging them with his hands as he squeezed them lightly, lifting them. After a moment, he shifted his focus to the tips, pinching them as if testing the hardness and then rolling them between his thumb and forefinger. Sensation arrowed from the tips of her breasts straight to her sex and the muscles along her channel clenched and relaxed, forcing heated moisture into the passage.

  He dragged in a shaky breath and met her gaze for a long moment.

  Releasing her breasts, Dax pulled her down onto her bunk with him, settling on his side and directing her with his hands onto her back. Bending one arm, he propped on it and studied her body as he examined her flesh with his hands and fingertips, touching, lightly stroking, kneading.

  She watched his face, allowing his exploration, wondering what was going through his mind. Was it purely curiosity? Or was it arousing him as much as it was her? Or was it a little of both?

  How different was she, truly, from his people? If she could see his true form, would she be terrified? Repulsed?

  How different could they be from one another if he found her desirable?

  Or was the Sirian male like their Earthly counterparts? Aroused by their own needs and able to copulate when that need was high, regardless of the female, by simply focusing on their need rather than their partner?

  Was she any different when all was said and done? Despite her doubts, his touch created warming currents that drifted through her and seemed to collect and increase the longer he simulated her nerve endings with his touch until she found herself wanting to urge him to do more.

  As if he read her thoughts, he ceased to caress her with his hand and leaned closer, teasing her with the movements of his lips along her skin.

  Had he captured her thoughts, she wondered as she felt herself sinking more deeply under the spell of mounting pleasure?

  She discovered she didn't really care when his questing mouth found the tip of one breast and his lips closed around it. Her breath left her in a gasping rush. Her eyes slammed shut to embrace the exquisite sensation bombarding her.

  He released her nipple at the sound and lifted his head. She sensed his gaze on her face and struggled to lift her eyelids. Even as they parted, she watched the descent of his dark head once more through her lashes, watched his mouth close around the tip once more and then his cheeks sink inward as he sucked on it.

  The heated current that flowed through her was more pronounced that time. She squeezed her eyes closed again and lifted a hand to cup his head to her breast, silently urging him to give her more. Her mind clouded with the surge of pleasure drugs into her system. She held her breath, focused completely on the curl of his tongue around her nipple and the tugging sensation as he drew on it with the suction of his mouth. The muscles low in her belly fluttered madly in response. Her clit, as engorged and sensitized by now as her nipples, began to ache with the pulsing rhythm of her heart.

  As he shifted his attention from one nipple to the other, she searched blindly for his hand, tugging on his arm until she could guide his hand to her clit. He broke off, watching as she cupped his hand over her mound and guided his movements until she found the rhythm that produced the hardest jolts of almost electric current from her clitoris and into her womb.

  Apparently satisfied after a few moments that he'd mastered the rhythm she wanted, he took her nipple into his mouth again and sucked it as he had the first.

  He'd certainly mastered it! For a few minutes Kate luxuriated in the twin stimulations, her breath hitching in her chest each time a fresh wave clashed inside of her like colliding cymbals. Abruptly, it wasn't enough, and it was too much at the same time. Her body leapt from satisfaction in the acute pleasure to impatience for more, from passive enjoyment to the certainty that she was going to come if he continued.

  The hollowness in her lower belly began to beg to be filled. The certainty filled her that disappointment was going to leaven her pleasure if he wasn't inside of her when she came.

  "Dax!" she gasped.

  He ceased his play and lifted his head.

  He didn't know what she wanted!

  She surged toward him, pushing him onto his back with her weight and straddled his hips. Lifting up onto her knees, she searched for his cock a little frantically, grasped it and guided it to the mouth of her sex. The muscles there seemed to clench in an effort to swallow his flesh, ached with the need to feel it.

  Despite the copious moisture she'd produced, it was a struggle for a few moments to engulf his rigid flesh. He seemed disconcerted, briefly, that she'd opted to mount him, but he steadied her by gripping her hips with his hands as she teetered above him.

  She lifted and settled again until she'd managed to sheathe him completely, until she could feel the roughness of his pubic hair brushing her throbbing clit. A low groan of pleasure escaped her as she ground herself against him.

  She didn't want to move. The feel of his thick flesh deep inside of her and the brush of his hair against her clit sent her spiraling closer to climax and she focused on attaining it, rotating her hips and grinding against him. With each movement of her hips, she felt her goal almost within her grasp. She lifted slightly away from him and ground her hips tightly against his belly again and again, over and over, gasping, holding her breath each time she felt tremors that warned of explosi
on.

  Abruptly, she was seized by the convulsions she craved. She sucked in a sharp breath and released a long, low, almost animalistic groan as her body quaked. Dax's hands tightened on her hips almost bruisingly as the muscles along her channel convulsed. She was too mindless with the waves of rapture clashing inside of her to have much awareness of anything else, her muscles beyond her ability to command to assist him as he began to lift her and settle her rhythmically in search of his own release. She struggled to obey the command of his hands anyway, awkwardly rising and falling so that her body stroked his cock.

  He arched abruptly, lifting her, and then holding her as he thrust upward into her in a frantic, pounding rhythm. He began to come as her own climax reached a crescendo and began to abate. As weak as water in the aftermath, struggling between consciousness and unconsciousness, she wilted against him when he finally drove deeply inside of her and held her pelvis tightly against his as he pumped the last of his seed into her.

  A different sort of pleasure invaded her as she lay against his chest, feeling the rise and fall of his ragged breaths, listening to the pounding rhythm of his heart. There was something deeply satisfying about knowing she'd given pleasure and not simply received it. It was almost more fulfilling to know he'd found pleasure in her than achieving her own climax. It was certainly as gratifying.

  He curled his arms tightly around her and her satisfaction deepened-briefly-with the display of affection.

  Then he turned over and she was left wondering if it had been nothing more than a reluctance to toss her off while he shifted into a more comfortable position. The brief flare of confusion and disappointment abated when he snugged her against his chest instead of releasing her completely.

  She settled her cheek more comfortably and allowed herself to drift toward sleep. As she lay drowsing, though, she recalled what had aroused her from sleep to start with.

  She'd heard faint, almost furtive movement at the door of her cabin and gotten up to investigate-and found Dax.

  "Why were you at my door?" she asked drowsily.

  Tonight was my night to guard you from harm.

  Kate rolled that around in her mind for a few moments. His night? Indicating they took turns? A mixture of emotions flitted through her. "What do you think might harm me? We're on a ship. There's no threat here. Everyone was carefully screened."

  How do you know this?

  Kate released a sound of indulgent amusement. "It's standard procedure. Believe me our government screens everyone carefully. Everyone has to go through rigid examinations to determine their health-both physical and mental-their skills, and their genetics to become a colonist. Only the best of the best will do."

  How do you know that their objective is to send only the best? Maybe they want the best to stay and want to remove the least desirable?

  Uneasiness crawled along Kate's spine. "That certainly isn't very flattering to me!" she said in an attempt to lighten the vague sense of anxiety that had crept into her mind to wonder if he knew something she didn't.

  You and the others like Sissy applied to become colonists. What of those that were brought onboard by the military? Those that you said the government had forced to come? There were those among the humans caged with us who were certainly not the best of humans that we have encountered-not in any way. Some had come from other prisons before.

  Kate pulled away from him abruptly and stared at him. "You're sure?" She realized she didn't actually need him to confirm, however, and she didn't feel even a flicker of doubt that he was telling the truth.

  It made too much sense. Why, indeed, would the government only want to send the best of the best away and keep society's dregs for the home world?

  "Oh god! Oh my god!" They were going into a potentially hostile environment with people who couldn't be trusted to behave in a socially acceptable manner on their own world-with all of the controls they had in place there!

  Cold fear crept over her as she considered the implications.

  Dax gathered her close again. You belong to me. I will not allow harm to come to you.

  It was comforting and yet left her with a strange sense of loss, too. It wasn't until she was on the edge of sleep that she realized why it made her sad.

  It hinted at true feelings for her and yet she knew deep down that it was nothing more than the primal instinct to protect his young. Dax wasn't human. He couldn't possibly understand, or feel, the bonds of affection that humans built between them.

  * * * *

  Kate debated whether it would be more practical, and safer for the Sirians, if she simply moved into their cabin with them, but it was already cramped, as Ronan had pointed out. On the other hand, she didn't think it was a good idea to allow them to stand guard outside her cabin during the 'night' periods either.

  And she didn't feel nearly as safe being alone after the discussion that she'd had with Dax.

  She compromised by insisting that if they were determined to stand watch over her, they were going to have to do it inside. She had a feeling that that was a great deal more appealing to them than standing outside her door anyway.

  She had mixed feelings about it herself. She didn't actually object to having a sleeping partner at night. It made her feel safer and the sex was good even when she wasn't particularly in the mood-and great when she was.

  There was a downside. It seemed there always was one.

  The downside was a biggy in this case, however.

  No matter how many times she told herself that the growing closeness she felt between herself and the Sirians was an illusion-that Ronan, Dax, and Jarek were merely following their natural instinct to guard 'their nestlings', she couldn't convince her heart.

  She tried to tell herself that it was a sort of transference thing, that she'd grown fond of the Sirians when they were her test subjects and dependent upon her. It was just that affection, already developed, her pleasure in mentoring when they were so quick to learn, and her enjoyment of them as lovers that made her feel … way more fondness than she should have.

  "You're too attached to them," Sissy observed one day when Kate met with her in the Rec room to update Sissy on their progress. "You've lost any objectivity you might have had. And, truthfully, I'm not sure you ever were as objective as you should have been."

  Kate felt herself blushing with a mixture of guilt and resentment. "So … you're saying I'm giving them more credit than they deserve? You don't think they've made as much progress as I do?"

  Sissy released an irritated huff. "I'm not disputing that. As bad as I hate to admit it, I think you were right. The Sirians have a capacity for learning that leaves us humans in the dust. What I'm trying to point out is that they are imitators, Kate. They've picked up absolutely everything you've set out to teach them. Even their language skills are vastly improved. Granted, they're still a bit rough around the edges as far as social skills, but they could pass for an uncouth human pretty easily."

  Kate's anger flared a little higher. "I'm not so prejudiced that I can't see that they haven't entirely grasped some of the finer points of polite behavior, but-honest to god, Sissy!-they haven't had years to learn these things! It's only been a few weeks."

  "Plus a year more or less. They were just as busy studying us while we had them in the habitat as we were studying them."

  Kate's lips tightened. "So a little over a year! Except I wasn't trying to teach them then. And they didn't have a lot of humans to learn from-or situations."

  "They haven't had a lot of situations to learn from lately either-not when they don't interact with anyone but you. And you're completely missing my point," Sissy said, anger threading her voice despite the fact that she kept her tone low since they were in a public place. "I'm worried about your … attachment to them, Kate! I'm particularly worried when you seem determined to ignore the most basic, known fact about the Sirians! They are natural born imitators. I'm not trying to pry into your personal life, but …."

  "But you're going
to just the same."

  "No, I'm not! I've no desire to hear the gritty details, thank you! I'm just curious to know if you, as a scientist, have actually learned a damned thing about them or if they're the ones reaping the entire benefit of your little experiment! I'm afraid that you're going to get hurt if you allow yourself to believe that they … reciprocate your feelings."

  That comment struck a nerve despite Kate's anger and she felt her emotions take a sharp dip. It was enough of an indicator that Sissy was right. She wasn't objective at all. She was emotionally involved.

  She cleared her throat. "I'm fond of them. I'm not even going to try to deny it. But you know as well as I do that it isn't safe for them to interact with any of the other colonists until they can pass as humans."

  Sissy stared at her. "Well maybe it hasn't occurred to you-since you're so focused on their protection-that you might well be training them to be more dangerous enemies if this … project goes sour? They will know all about us and we still know damned little about them!"

  "How much do you think they can tell me when they've never been on their home world and never had any chance to interact with their own kind?" Kate said angrily. "If you're insinuating that they're gathering intell …."

  "They could be. That's the problem, Kate, the one you refuse to see. You've been totally focused on teaching them how to completely fool us-when you haven't been focused on … bedroom gymnastics! Have you got some crazy idea that you can … mold them into human beings and live happily ever after with them? Because they aren't human! They are never going to be human even if they can imitate us right down to the smallest molecule-they'll still be imitations mimicking human behavior." She snapped her fingers. "And just like that they could change the way they look and even you would never know them if they walked by you!"

  Kate was so distressed and angry that she couldn't think straight but, as badly as she hated to admit it, Sissy had raised some valid concerns … and planted seeds of doubt that she wanted very badly to dispute.